Microsoft

I served as a Designer and Program Manager Intern at Microsoft during Summer 2014. I worked with a team of four development interns to design and implement a Windows application from start to finish. The program, Microsoft Garage, is an incubator within Microsoft where teams of five interns (4 developers, 1 program manager/designer) follow fast and dynamic agile methodologies to bring a novel idea to Windows. My team partnered with other Microsoft product teams to integrate their technology into our application.

While I can't go into detail about our application until its release, I can describe a little about my responsibilities:

As a program manager, I explored and designed features to address customer needs, worked closely with development teammates to ensure these features were integrated into our application on time, and steered the team around obstacles during the process.

As a designer, I implemented the user interface of the application with a focus on creating a unique identity for our application. I also incorporated Windows design language into the application. I organized weekly meetings with other designers to offer a creative space where we could each provide and receive feedback.

On another note, I represented Microsoft as a panelist encouraging 15-17 year olds at Girls Who Code. This experience was meaningful to me as I saw girls, who started out reticent and somewhat lackluster, become increasingly excited and curious as I described typical days as a Microsoft Intern. After the panel concluded, swarms of girls came up to me probing question after question about how to get more involved in the tech industry.